


once upon a time

by yubiniverse



Category: Dreamcatcher (Korea Band)
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - College/University, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Established Relationship, F/F, Hospitals, Pining, Polyamory, seonghwa is the voice of reason, yubin is sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-19
Updated: 2020-03-19
Packaged: 2021-02-28 19:42:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23212711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yubiniverse/pseuds/yubiniverse
Summary: “Perhaps someday I’ll crawl back home, beaten, defeated. But not as long as I can make stories out of my heartbreak, beauty out of sorrow.”- Sylvia Plath
Relationships: Han Dong | Handong/Lee Gahyeon (minor), Kim Bora | SuA/Lee Siyeon (minor), Kim Minji | JiU/Kim Yoohyeon, Kim Minji | JiU/Lee Yoobin | Dami, Kim Yoohyeon/Lee Yoobin | Dami, Kim Yoohyeon/Lee Yoobin | Dami/Kim Minji | JiU
Comments: 4
Kudos: 72





	once upon a time

**Author's Note:**

> hey y'all~ this has been sitting in my drafts for a while, but with school being cancelled this week, i finally got around to finishing it, so let me know what you think! as always, feedback is always appreciated in any capacity. i hope you enjoy~
> 
> \- luo

“Hey, Yubin-ah, we’re watching movies, if you want to join us?”

Minji’s gentle voice startled Yubin, and the bewildered producer glanced up to see the taller woman leaning against the door frame. Her purple-hued hair was drawn up in a messy ponytail, circular glasses perched upon the bridge of her nose. It was clear by Minji’s attire that the older student wasn’t planning on going out tonight; she was dressed in baggy sweatpants, along with an equally large hoodie, one that Yubin knew for a fact belonged to Yoohyeon.

_As if you’d have a chance anyways,_ Yubin thought bitterly to herself, _it’s best to just let it go._

“Is everything alright?” Minji asked, her brow furrowed in concern, and the younger was broken from her reverie within moments.

Yubin took out her earbuds, leaning back in her chair and sighing. “I’m planning on going out tonight, actually,” the producer murmured in response, briefly glancing over at the clock on her computer, noting that it was nearly 9pm. “Sorry, unnie. Maybe next time?”

“Oh,” Minji blinked, seeming genuinely surprised by Yubin’s answer, before she opened her mouth to keep speaking. “Alright, then. Just be safe, okay?”

“Yes, _eomma_ ,” the younger music student replied teasingly, a cheeky smirk on her countenance as she resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “Seriously, don’t worry about it. Go have fun.”

“Well, okay,” Minji finally relented, giving her a smile before departing from the doorway, presumably towards their shared living room, where Yubin could already hear the sound of the television. The producer sighed, leaning back in her chair, before standing up and stretching her arms over her head. Without a second thought, she shut off her laptop and went to get changed.

Yubin stood in front of the mirror, glancing over her own appearance until she was satisfied. She had put on a collared shirt over a loose white tee, which she decided to leave partially unbuttoned. She also wore dark gray skinny jeans and a pair of black chucks, putting on a rather minimal amount of makeup. The club she was visiting tonight was reputed as one of the most sought-out gay bars in the city, but Yubin still wanted to look as non-heterosexual as possible. The producer ran a hand through her short black hair, before sighing and grabbing her keys off the desk, making her way towards the door.

On the way out of the apartment, Yubin chanced a look at the television, just in time to see Iron-Man get blasted across the screen.

_I can already guess who picked the movie,_ Yubin mused to herself, her gaze dropping to the occupants of the living room. Bora was curled up against Siyeon, followed by Gahyeon dozing off against Handong’s shoulder. Her eyes landed on the final pair, Minji and Yoohyeon, ignoring the ache in her chest when she saw the latter nuzzled in the crook of Minji’s neck. She shook her head, moving to leave the apartment as quietly as possible.

_Utopia_ was actually a fairly hole-in-the-wall type of club, which never failed to surprise Yubin every time she visited. The producer always imagined the bar to have a more extravagant look to it, being that it was one of the most well-known gay bars in the area, but aside from the slanted gold lettering on it’s faded signage, the red-brick establishment was actually quite easy to miss. After handing her ID over to the bouncer, Hyojin, she was let through, and the producer was all too quickly making a beeline for the bar.

“I didn’t expect you to be back so soon, _Binbin_ ,” a familiar voice commented from a few feet away, and Yubin glanced up with a scowl. Her eyes landed on a smiling Seonghwa, polishing a pint glass with a dish towel from behind the bar.

“I told you not to call me that,” Yubin gave him a withering stare, but the annoyance just as easily melted away from her eyes as she leaned back in the bar chair. “Speak for yourself, _Hwaseong_. I thought you weren’t working tonight?”

“I picked up some more shifts,” Seonghwa explained, setting the glass down on the counter as he leaned forward. “Your usual?”

“Yep,” Yubin sighed, glancing over her shoulder into the mass of bodies milling about the club. The producer could just make out the music over the cacophony of voices in the crowd, vaguely recognizing the sound of TVXQ’s _The Chance of Love_ filtering from the speakers behind her.

By the time she returned her attention back to Seonghwa making her drink, she noticed that she was no longer alone at the bar, her gaze drifting to a trio of women to her right side a few seats down. The small thud of a glass meeting the counter brought Yubin out of her reverie, Seonghwa giving her a knowing look as he slid the glass of rum towards the producer. “Have you fixed the problem?”

“What problem?” Yubin played dumb, bringing her drink up to her lips, feeling her piercing clink gently on the glass as she averted her eyes from the blonde bartender across from her.

“Yubin, please,” Seonghwa gave her a pointed look. “You know what I’m talking about.”

“Please just drop it, Seonghwa,” the producer muttered, downing the rest of her drink, trying her hardest to not slam the glass on the counter. She glanced over at the trio of girls sitting adjacent to her, briefly making eye contact with one of them, taking in her shoulder-length blonde bob and catlike features, before returning her attention to the younger man behind the bar. “It’s best if I just forget about it.” The music student tapped her fingers along the now-empty glass, running a hand through her short black hair. “I’ll get over it.”

“I think it would do you well to remember,” Seonghwa lowered his voice, just enough that only Yubin would hear as he began to pour her another drink, “communication is key in any relationship, if nothing else.”

Her gaze drifted back towards the blonde sitting a few seats down, meeting eyes with the woman once more as she pondered over Seonghwa’s words.

_Not this time, Hwaseong,_ Yubin mused to herself bitterly, downing what she knew would be only her second of many drinks that night. 

_There’s no point, anyways._

* * *

“If this section is in compound meter, then that means that the melody should be conducted in five…” Yubin muttered to herself, trying to tap out the subdivisions on the table with her pencil. 

The producer didn’t at all dislike her major, but out of all the units in her music theory class, she dreaded subdivisions of time signatures the most. Still, she knew it was critical to her career as a sound engineer, so Yubin would do everything in her power to pass the class, lest she have to deal with the theory professor ever again.

Thus, she was studying with Yoohyeon, who she typically partnered up with in class for most projects, such as the one they were working on now. Or, they would be, if Yoohyeon would just get off her damn phone. The incessant buzzing of the taller woman’s device was starting to get on Yubin’s nerves, and every time she tried to focus on her work, the random intervals of noise in the otherwise silent room were just enough to break her concentration.

“What scale degree is Mixolydian again?” No response.

Yubin sighed inaudibly, scribbling barely-legible notes in the margins of the score in front of her. From the corner of her vision, she could see Yoohyeon texting someone.

(Well, Yubin knew for a fact that she was texting Minji, but it made the producer feel better to imagine it was somebody else - that’s what she told herself, anyways.)

There was a tiny flicker of hope in her heart when Yubin saw the taller girl set her phone down and type something on her computer, but it was just as easily crushed when she felt the older student’s phone vibrate on the desk, the screen lighting up with a string of text messages. Yubin felt her eye begin to twitch when the producer heard Yoohyeon pick up the phone, giggling as she frenetically texted back.

“There’s a tempo change at measure 78,” Yubin muttered, taking a sip of her water. “should the conducting pattern change to being felt in one?”

_Buzz._

Yubin’s grip tightened on the glass in her hand. “Should we move the melody line around the ensemble to achieve a new texture?”

_Buzz._

“Are you even listening to me, Yoohyeon?” Yubin ground out through gritted teeth, lifting her eyes to glance at the music student, unable to keep the annoyance from creeping into her tone.

“Of course,” the silver-haired woman replied after a few moments of lengthy pause, before her phone buzzed again, and she was just as quickly preoccupied with the device.

The glass in Yubin’s hand promptly shattered mere seconds later, the jarring noise startling Yoohyeon, who dropped her phone on the table and looked up in alarm. There was a dull ache in her hand, as the producer belatedly took notice of the shards of glass embedded in her palm and the fresh rivulets of crimson running down her wrist. She didn’t realize how badly her hand was trembling until there was nothing for the producer to squeeze, only the sharp fragments lodged in her skin and the faint throb of pain gnawing away at her ensanguined fingers.

_Oh,_ Yubin’s gaze drifted down to the score spread out across the dining room table, blood now pooling on top of the mess of papers. _Guess I’ll have to start all over, then._

“Shit, Yubin,” Yoohyeon cursed, jumping up from her seat across the table and hurriedly circling around to the younger girl’s side, her eyes wide with worry as she took hold of the producer’s wrist to inspect it. “Are you okay? Let’s clean your hand off-”

“Stop it,” Yubin snapped, wrenching her arm from the taller woman’s grip, taking a step back from the music student, who seemed genuinely stunned by the younger’s hostility. The producer shot her a withering look, ignoring the kicked-puppy look on Yoohyeon’s face as Yubin shouldered past her to remove the glass from her hand. “Just...just forget about it.”

She didn’t bother looking back as she made her way to the bathroom, though she could feel Yoohyeon burning a hole in her back with the intensity of the taller woman’s stare.

For the rest of the afternoon, Yubin couldn’t bear to look Yoohyeon in the eye, even going as far as to skip dinner with the other girls that night. The producer sat in her room, examining her gauze-wrapped hand beneath the overhead light.

_Just another reminder of something I’ll never be able to have,_ Yubin thought bitterly to herself, and though the quietness permeating the house during dinner time struck her as odd, the producer resigned herself to the fact that she wouldn’t be eating tonight.

* * *

_[10:06] pandami:_

_hey, you’re stopping by today for the project, right?_

Yubin checked her phone for what felt like the millionth time that day, letting out a sigh when she saw no new notifications. It had been over three hours since she’d sent that text, and the producer was beginning to doubt that Minji would ever reply back, at this point.

Minji wasn’t a music student, but being that they were friends, the older student had agreed to help Yubin out with a project for her music production class, which entailed producing and recording a song independent of the professor’s assistance - and besides, despite the fact that Minji was not majoring in vocal performance, the younger thought she had a beautiful singing voice, even if Minji herself didn’t seem to think so.

Yubin anxiously tapped her fingers against the mixing console in front of her, her gaze drifting to the digitized clock displayed beside the recording booth of her studio, the blinking red numbers indicating that it was already _2:17pm_ , with no word from her would-be vocalist.

Her gaze drifted to her bandaged palm, which she briefly inspected under the dim lights of the studio. The pain in her hand had gradually tapered away to a dull throb, which was reasonably easy to ignore; she only really was bothered by it if she thought about it, which was more often than she would have liked.

Ever since the _Glass Incident™_ last week, Yubin had taken to avoiding Yoohyeon like the plague, and tried to make herself as scarce as possible when it came to being in the house. She typically would spend her time either sulking over at _Utopia_ (and, consequently dealing with Seonghwa’s parent-esque scolding), or camping out at the recording studio she owned. Of course, she couldn’t just avoid Yoohyeon altogether, seeing as they had several classes together, but Yubin liked to think she was doing a damn good job of ignoring her problems. 

(Yoohyeon being one of them, of course.)

In hindsight, Yubin probably shouldn’t have given her housemates an entire week of radio silence only to expect that any of them would just text her back when the producer needed something from them. This collaboration had been arranged with Minji months prior, though, and the older woman wasn’t typically the person to forget - she’d even heard her practicing the melody with Yoohyeon last Monday.

(The thought had her chest tightening, but if Yubin knew why, she didn’t dare acknowledge it.)

With her uninjured hand, Yubin unlocked her phone, scrolling through her contacts until she found who she was looking for. Minji’s information flashed across the screen, and the producer finally dialed her number after a few moments of hesitation, bringing the receiver up to her ear.

_I didn’t mess up the date, did I…?_ the music student thought to herself with a frown.

After a few rings, the other line picked up, much to Yubin’s surprise. She couldn’t help but feel a pit of apprehension forming in her stomach when she heard Minji’s voice through the speaker.

_“Hello?”_

Yubin swallowed the dryness in her throat, before speaking into the receiver. “Hey, unnie.”

_“Oh, Yubin,”_ Minji replied, and the producer could clearly make out the surprise coloring her tone. _“Is everything alright?”_

“Yes, everything’s fine,” Yubin bit her lip, contemplating what to say next, taking a deep breath to steady herself. “I was just wondering when you’d be coming by the studio today?”

_“The studio?”_ Minji repeated slowly, and Yubin felt her heart drop when she comprehended the older girl’s words. _“For what, may I ask?”_

“The collaboration project,” the producer fought to keep her voice as neutral as possible. “We were supposed to record today, but maybe you didn’t get my text this morning…?”

_“Oh, shit,”_ the older woman cursed over the line, _“I’m so sorry Yubin, I can’t believe I forgot… I’m out with Yoohyeon-ah right now, but I can come over in twenty?”_

“Don’t worry about it,” the producer managed to get out, worried that Minji would be able to decipher the emotion in her voice. “We’ll find another day to do it instead… I have work to do, anyways.”

_“Well…”_ It wasn’t hard to make out the frown in Minji’s voice, despite the fact that the younger couldn’t see the dance major on the other side of the line. _“Are you sure?”_

“Positive,” Yubin insisted. “Um, enjoy your...date. I’ll talk to you later.” Without allowing Minji to say anything else, she ended the call and leaned back in her chair, bringing a hand up to her watering eyes in order to wipe away any stray tears.

Opening her laptop and signing in, Yubin took a shaky breath, trying to ignore the lump in her throat as she pulled up FL Studio to start working.

“She just forgot,” Yubin told herself, plugging her computer into the soundboard, “Minji wouldn’t blow me off on purpose…”

Deep down, though, Yubin wasn’t sure if she could convince herself that it was true.

_She wouldn’t…_ the producer thought to herself, her conviction sounding weak, even to herself, _would she...?_

_Would she?_

* * *

“Hey, Yubin,” Minji’s voice called from the doorway, “we’re going out tonight, do you want to come with?”

Glancing up from her computer, the producer took her headphones off and spun in her chair, now facing the older woman leaning against the wall. “Huh?”

“Girl’s night out. You wanna join us?”

“Ah,” Yubin acquiesced, letting the silence grow between them, turning back towards her laptop. “I think I’ll stay in tonight, actually.” She flashed Minji what she hoped looked like an apologetic look, before continuing to type on her computer. “I have work to catch up on... Go have fun, though.”

“Are you sure?” Minji asked with a frown, and Yubin felt her chest tighten at the genuine concern in her voice. “I know you tend to be a busy person, but all that stress can’t be good for your health…”

Yubin sighed, halting her work once more and turning to the older student, this time holding her gaze for several moments. “I will be fine, unnie. Stop worrying so much.”

“Well, alright…” the taller woman’s brow furrowed, but she ultimately relented to the younger student’s insistence. “Remember to take a break every now and then,” Minji told her sternly, before her expression softened and she made to finally leave the room. Yubin had seen a variety of emotions cross the older student’s countenance, but it was so quick that she couldn’t quite process what Minji might have been feeling. The producer was curious, but decided not to think too much about it, knowing that she had a tendency to read into others’ actions more than what would be considered healthy.

Yubin waited until she was positive that she had heard the apartment door close before letting out a long sigh, staring blankly at her computer screen. She hadn’t been able to make very much progress on most of her projects, but she had at least managed to finish one of her songs, and she found herself to actually be quite satisfied with the end result. Pulling up the score on her laptop, she exported it and clicked the ‘print’ button when it popped up, only standing when she heard the beep of their shared printer, getting up to retrieve the papers.

_Once upon a time_

Humming to herself, Yubin turned off her laptop and closed the lid, setting the new music score down on her already-messy desk, glancing around for a pencil to start marking the margins of the music with. Instead, the producer’s eyes landed on the cardboard box beside her shelf, and she got up to investigate what was inside it.

Crouching beside the box, she carefully unfolded the closed flaps, taking a deep breath as she laid eyes on its contents. Several bottles of various liquor were the first thing she saw, followed by what looked to be an unopened case of beer. On top of the less potent alcohol was a little sticky note with writing on it, and though it was definitely her own scripture, Yubin couldn’t ever recall writing it - frankly, she wasn’t sure where the box of booze had even come from, but she glanced over the paper anyways.

_“Perhaps someday I’ll crawl back home, beaten, defeated. But not as long as I can make stories out of my heartbreak, beauty out of sorrow.”_

_\- Sylvia Plath_

Yubin discarded the note, rummaging through the box as she pulled out a bottle of rum, gingerly turning the glass in her hands.

_One drink couldn’t hurt, right?_

* * *

“I still can’t believe I got carded,” Gahyeon sulked as they walked inside, putting her ID back in her wallet. “Seriously, I’m not some kid that’s here to drink Pepsi!”

“We know,” her girlfriend told her, patting the younger’s shoulder in fake sympathy. “Let’s go get some beer to take your mind off of it, okay?”

“Okay,” Gahyeon mumbled, leaning her head on Handong’s shoulder as the older woman steered them towards the bar. 

Yoohyeon glanced around the establishment, only to notice that Bora and Siyeon had already vanished, and she knew for a fact that the former was probably out on the dance floor...typical, really. That just left Minji, not that the younger girl minded, seeking out the purple-haired woman’s hand and squeezing it gently. She didn’t need to see Minji’s face to know that the older student was smiling. She decided to take a page out of Gahyeon and Handong’s book, guiding her and Minji towards a few open bar stools. Tonight was about having fun, though, as Yoohyeon thought on it, there seemed to be something absent this time - perhaps it was because not all of them were here.

_I hope Yubin’s doing okay,_ Yoohyeon thought with a frown, taking a seat at the bar, and she spotted Minji follow suit from the corner of her eye. The music student glanced over at her girlfriend, thinking about what she wanted to order, before a flash of blonde hair from behind the counter caught her eye.

The bartender, Yoohyeon realized, seemed familiar, though she couldn’t quite place where she knew him from. A brief look of recognition flashed across his expression as their eyes met, but Yoohyeon was struggling to remember why she recalled his face.

“Hello, Yoohyeon, and…” the blonde bartender’s countenance contorting into a frown as his gaze drifted towards the other woman, “...Minji, if I’m remembering correctly?” Like a switch in her head was flipped, Yoohyeon finally realized where she remembered him from; whenever Yubin wasn’t hanging out with the girls, she had often seen the younger girl on campus with the taller man, even before they had become housemates. 

_There’s no doubt that Yubin’s about as straight as a circle, but were they maybe…?_

“Seonghwa-ssi,” Yoohyeon finally spoke, realizing that neither her or Minji had responded to him yet. “I didn’t know you worked here?”

“I own the most prolific gay bar in town, of _course_ I work here,” Seonghwa scoffed, and something indicernable flashed in his eyes, before he looked between her and Minji. “Where’s Binbin?”

“...Binbin?” Minji repeated slowly, furrowing her brow at the bartender.

“Yubin,” Seonghwa clarified, clearing his throat. “She’s been coming here pretty much the entire month… so, where is she?” He asked with a frown, setting down the glass he was cleaning. “I figured she would have come here with you two…”

“She wanted to stay home,” Minji answered, sighing as she propped her elbows up on the bar. “Something about having work to do? I invited her, since I wanted all seven of us to go out and have fun, but…”

Yoohyeon was caught off guard by the grim expression quickly forming on Seonghwa’s face, and for a while, he didn’t say anything. “You should leave.”

Minji blanched, startled by the bluntness of his statement. “What?”

“Please don’t take this the wrong way, and I know your night just started,” the bartender began, lowering his voice so that only the two women in front of him could make out his words. “But, I think you should go home, and make sure that Yubin is alright. Do you think you can do that for me?”

“Of course, but…” Yoohyeon acquiesced, but Seonghwa could tell there was a hint of hesitation in her voice. “What makes you say that?”

“Please, Yoohyeon-ah,” the bartender insisted, a sober look in his eyes, taking the shorter girl by surprise. “Just check on her. If everything’s fine, then you can come back, and I’ll give you something on the house. Deal?”

Yoohyeon directed her gaze towards her girlfriend, exchanging glances with Minji before nodding and turning her attention back to Seonghwa. “Okay, then. Deal.”

As she and Minji left the bar and headed towards the entrance, Yoohyeon all too easily felt how much faster her heart was beating. Seonghwa’s concern for Yubin was endearing, yes, but as they approached the car, Yoohyeon couldn’t help but notice the pit of dread forming in her stomach.

_I hope you’re wrong, Seonghwa,_ the silver-haired woman bit her lip, climbing into the front seat as Minji started up the vehicle.

* * *

The apartment was quiet, not that Yoohyeon was really surprised; Yubin, by nature, was not a loud person. If she didn’t know any better, she would have thought the younger girl to be asleep. The only problem was, most of the lights were on in the living room; if the producer had gone to bed, Yoohyeon highly doubted she would just leave the house lights on, and it was already well past midnight. That alone was enough to set off alarm bells in her mind, but Yoohyeon didn’t want to jump to any conclusions just yet.

“Well, she isn’t in the kitchen,” Minji informed her, walking around the counter to meet the younger girl in the living room, “and she isn’t in the bathroom, either…”

“Then that just leaves her…” Yoohyeon trailed off as she made her way towards the hallway, glancing around the vicinity for any odd details. Though she was vaguely aware of Minji a few paces behind her, the pounding of her heart and the roar of blood in her ears was all she could really focus on. Her steps slowed down as she reached the end of the corridor, pivoting to see a familiar door slightly ajar, though she couldn’t see any discernible light creeping out from the gap of the wood. She gently pushed the door further open, and she froze in her tracks, almost bumping into Minji in the process. “...room…”

The lights were off in Yubin’s room, but the overwhelming smell of alcohol permeated the air, and Yoohyeon could make out the shape of several empty bottles and crinkled cans littering the floor. The scent of mixed liquor was almost nauseating to Yoohyeon, but she swallowed the bile in her throat and flicked the lights on, moving further into the room to see if she could see where Yubin might be.

That was, until she almost tripped over a sizable lump right in front of her, stumbling to catch her balance. After she steadied herself, Yoohyeon turned to see what she had nearly fallen on, feeling her eyes widen and her stomach drop.

Yubin was slumped on the floor, eyes closed with her hand loosely wrapped around a can of beer. Yoohyeon tried to listen for her breathing, but when she couldn’t discern a regular rhythm from the younger’s parted lips, she felt a wave of panic overcome her, dropping to her knees and frantically feeling for a pulse along the unconscious woman’s throat. Yoohyeon let out a sigh of relief when she felt a small thump against her fingertips, but it was short-lived, as the taller woman soon realized her heart wasn’t beating in steady intervals.

“Minji,” Yoohyeon whipped her head up towards her girlfriend, her gaze desperate as she gestured to the unresponsive woman beside her, “Can you-”

“Of course,” the older woman replied immediately, bending down to take over, removing the half-empty can of beer from Yubin’s grip before trying to sit the girl up against the bed adjacent to them. She glanced behind her, horrified at the sheer number of empty bottles and cans cluttering the carpet.

_Did Seonghwa know she was going to…?_

Yoohyeon meanwhile fumbled with her phone, trying to open the keypad, but her hands were trembling so bad that it took several moments to actually enter the number and bring the device up to her ear. She began to pace about the room, each consecutive ring of the phone only serving to heighten her anxiety.

_“119, what’s your emergency?”_ The voice of the dispatch caller filtered through the receiver, and Yoohyeon couldn’t help but let out a sigh of relief.

“It’s my friend,” Yoohyeon managed to choke out, fighting to keep her voice as level as possible. “M-my housemate, we found her-”

_“Please take a deep breath, miss,”_ the operator told her. _“What happened to your housemate?”_

“My girlfriend and I came home,” Yoohyeon started over, trying to follow the dispatch caller’s instructions to the best of her ability. “We found my housemate. She- her heartbeat is irregular, but she’s not responsive…” She paused, trying to collect herself. “She’s been drinking, and…” Yoohyeon swallowed the lump in her throat, trying to force the rest of the words out. “We think my housemate has alcohol poisoning.”

* * *

The ride to the hospital was a silent one, and Yoohyeon refused to open her mouth in an attempt to break the heavy atmosphere, the tension choking any levity out of the ambulance. Her gaze fell on their housemate, who still had yet to wake up, and the music student could feel her chest tighten at the sight.

Yoohyeon was by no means a patient person, and it was very apparent when they had gotten to the hospital; they had been told by the doctor to wait in the lobby until further notice, and while Minji had immediately sunk down into one of the cushioned chairs, Yoohyeon couldn’t stop herself from pacing about the room. She got some odd looks from the other occupants of the lobby, but the university student honestly couldn’t find it in her to care.

After several minutes, however, the silver-haired woman gave up, collapsing into the chair beside her girlfriend with a sigh of frustration. Her eyes flitted to the clock mounted on the wall, noting with despair that it wasn’t even 1:30am. Minji seemed to notice her discomfort, the older student seeking out Yoohyeon’s hand and gently lacing their fingers together, giving the younger a reassuring look. Despite the situation, Yoohyeon managed to return a similar smile.

It felt like it took forever, but the doctor who was taking care of their housemate finally rejoined them in the lobby, approaching languidly with a clipboard held close to his chest. “Kim...Yoohyeon?” He asked, after briefly looking down at his clipboard, adjusting his glasses.

The younger girl, who had been dozing off on Minji’s shoulder, blinked awake at the sound of his voice. Holding back a yawn, the university student straightened up, but didn’t let go of Minji’s hand. “Um, yes. That’s me.”

“Ms. Lee should be ready to leave in a few minutes, but we just need to run a few more tests before she can be discharged,” the doctor, whose name she couldn’t remember, stated in a calm voice. “In the meantime, you can come visit her until we’re done, if you’d like?”

“We would really appreciate that,” Minji chimed in, and Yoohyeon was silently grateful for her girlfriend taking over the situation, gently squeezing her hand in gratitude, a smile forming on her face when the older returned the gesture. Together, they rose to their feet and followed the unnamed doctor through the heavy door.

When they made it to Yubin’s hospital room, it took Yoohyeon all of her willpower to not pounce on the bedridden producer. The aforementioned student was sitting upright in bed, but she didn’t immediately notice the duo entering the room, and she still seemed kind of out of it.

Her obliviousness was short-lived, however, as Yubin turned her head toward the sound of footsteps, and her eyes widened in surprise. “Minji-unnie?” The producer paused, shock coloring her expression as she met the eyes of the woman beside her. “Y-Yoohyeon?”

“Yubin,” Yoohyeon choked out with watery eyes, lurching towards the side of the hospital bed, kneeling beside the younger as she gently grasped the producer’s palms. In the back of her mind, she noticed how the music student’s thin digits twitched and trembled; she took care to gently handle Yubin’s hands as if they were porcelain, as if they were moments away from shattering. “Yubin, I’m so glad you’re okay…”

“Don’t cry, Yoohyeonnie,” Yubin told her, giving the taller girl a wry smile. She thought about wiping away the tears on Yoohyeon’s face, but decided it was best if she didn’t. The producer didn’t trust her hands to be steady enough to be of any actual use, and with Minji watching mere feet away, a peculiar sense of guilt had taken over her body, preventing her from moving. “How did you two know…? I thought everyone had gone out…”

“Seonghwa-ssi informed us,” Minji interjected into the conversation, and though she wasn’t visibly crying, the weight of emotion in the older student’s gaze made the guilt fester in Yubin’s chest. “He told us to go home and check on you… I’m really glad we listened to him.”

“I’m sorry,” Yubin relented remorsefully, her gaze dropping down to her own hands. She curled her fingers around the blanket pooling around her waist, loathing at how absolutely weak it made her feel. “I don’t ever want to be a burden, and yet…”

Yoohyeon frowned, glancing back at Minji with confusion readily crossed her countenance, and the older student displayed a similar expression of concern - the statement was borderline ominous, and the taller woman couldn’t really place why Yubin would say something like that. Before she could ask the younger girl what she meant by that, however, their exchange was disturbed by the door being nudged open, the doctor from before stepping back into the room.

“Well, Ms. Lee, you are officially free to go,” the doctor spoke, breaking the prior spell of silence that had occupied the room. “Please take care from here on out, if you would?”

* * *

The drive back to their shared apartment was spent in complete silence, and to say that it was suffocating would be an understatement, at the very least. Yoohyeon didn’t have the heart to turn on the radio, nor did she desire to break the awkward tension with what would be equally awkward smalltalk. The music student occasionally raised her gaze to the rear view mirror where Yubin sat, but the producer was dejectedly looking to the side, avoiding eye contact with either of the girls sitting in front of her. Yoohyeon opened her mouth to say something, but just as quickly shut it, dropping her gaze to her lap, not sure what to do with herself.

_What are you supposed to say to someone that almost died a few hours ago?_ The silver-haired woman thought to herself bitterly. _Congratulations for surviving?_

She could tell that her girlfriend was having similar thoughts, based off of the turmoil too easily displayed on Minji’s face. Maybe the older woman wasn’t aware of it, but she was often an open book to those around her with whatever was on her mind. It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, but Yoohyeon hated knowing when Minji was troubled by something and wouldn’t confide in others about it.

More than that, though, Yubin’s despondent demeanor was worrying, especially after the events that had brought them to the current situation. Yoohyeon had far too many questions for the withdrawn producer, perhaps more than Yubin knew the answers to.

Minji, similarly, had questions for their housemate, but as soon as they made it inside of the apartment, it became very clear she was less willing to wait for the answers they were both in desperate need of.

“Yubin, we need to talk.”

The aforementioned producer had nearly made it to the hallway leading to her room when Minji spoke up. Yubin paused mid-step, remaining quiet for an extended period of time, before her shoulders sunk, turning to face the only two occupants of the living room. A sigh escaped from her chapped lips, but she made no move to approach either woman. “Why?” The black-haired student finally asked, tone seeming oddly defensive. “Can’t this wait until the morning?”

“We almost lost you tonight, so no, this can’t fucking wait,” Minji snapped, stunning Yubin with the harshness of her tone. Yoohyeon herself couldn’t help wincing at the sharpness in her lover’s voice, even if it was well-founded. “If it weren’t for Seonghwa, who knows if you’d be-”

“Please, Yubin, we’re not angry with you,” Yoohyeon quickly cut off her girlfriend, instead trying to focus on coaxing the younger woman to the couch in the living room. “It’s just- you had us worried sick.”

Yubin still looked hesitant, but after a pleading look from Yoohyeon, the producer reluctantly moved towards them, unceremoniously dropping herself onto the sofa. She didn’t dare to look up as both girls took a seat on either side of her. “Well?”

“Why were you drinking yourself half to death?” Minji questioned in a rather blunt tone, which once again caught Yubin off-guard, not responding at first. This noticeably frustrated the older woman, who opened her mouth to try again. “Yubin-”

“A lot like the Hegelian framework, Freud’s ideology in philosophy suggests that we all have desires, wants, wishes,” Yubin suddenly interrupted Minji, leaning back as she directed her gaze to the wall. She continued talking, and if she noticed either girl’s apparent confusion, she didn’t say anything to otherwise quell their perplexity. “Even if those desires are unattainable. The reality principle forces us to give up on those dreams, to displace them and substitute them with something else… but even then, we never truly let go of them, do we?”

“Yubin…?” Yoohyeon began tentatively, not sure where the younger was going with her otherwise cryptic words. She opened her mouth to say more, but the producer beat her to it.

“Let’s say that I was reminded of what I couldn’t ever have,” the younger woman muttered, “and I wanted to forget about it. In fact, I’ve tried to forget about it for the better half of two years, but never mind that.” She cleared her throat, still refusing to look up at the duo on either side of her.

“Realistically, I would have preferred that we stayed acquaintances. Friendship was already pushing it, and anything else was asking to be hurt, really…” Yubin’s tone suddenly turned bitter. “But then I had to go and fall in love with both of you.”

_Fall in love with-_

_...wait, what?_

“Well, there you have it, unnie,” the producer sneered, but it was plain to see that she was trying to hide the hurt in her expression. “I was trying to kill myself because I’m miserable and no one would ever love someone like me. And it would have worked, too, if stupid _Hwaseong_ hadn’t ratted me out.” Yubin moved to stand up, her expression impossible to decipher. “I was fine with neither of you finding out, but now you know… so, give me a day and I’ll be out of your lives forever.”

“No.”

The simple statement bewildered Yubin, who turned around to face them with a quizzical expression on her face. “What do you mean, ‘ _no_ ’?”

“I mean no,” Yoohyeon replied firmly, holding Yubin’s gaze with her own intense stare. “You can’t just...walk out of our lives like that, Yubin. Not if I have anything to say about it.”

“And what _do_ you have to say about it, Yoohyeon?” The younger girl retorted with a cynical look. “That you’re disgusted? Weirded out? Revolted?” Her expression contorted into a sneer. “I was already prepared for that, believe me-”  
  
“Stop putting words in my mouth!” The taller student snapped, getting up from the couch to approach the producer. Yubin almost immediately shrunk back, bravado vanishing in mere seconds. “If you would just _talk_ to us, you would know how we _really_ feel about you, instead of just jumping to conclusions and trying to...t-trying to end your life over something so- so _trivial!”_ The silver-haired woman fought the urge to backtrack when she saw the hurt flicker openly across Yubin’s meek expression.

Before Yubin could say anything else, however, Minji was quick to speak up. “Yoohyeon and I are dating… but we aren’t mutually exclusive,” she paused, quickly adding to her statement so that the younger girl couldn’t misconstrue the meaning behind her words, “or, at least we’re open to the possibility of somebody else in our relationship.”

“If you’re just saying that to make me feel better-”

“We’re not,” Yoohyeon cut her off, giving the shorter woman a meaningful look. “Minji and I have discussed it a lot… and if you’re willing to try, then I don’t see why we can’t make it work.”

Upon noticing Yubin’s look of hesitation, Minji frowned softly, brow furrowing as she thought of what else she could say to reassure the producer. “You...don’t need to make a decision now, Yubin-ah… but please think about it.” She stood up, slowly approaching the younger student, taking the producer’s hands in her own. “You matter a lot to us, even if you don’t think so.”

“Okay…” Yubin took a deep breath, closing her eyes. “...okay. Okay.” She glanced up to Minji, gaze briefly flitting over to Yoohyeon, and the vulnerability in the younger’s gaze was more than enough to make the purple-haired woman’s heart hurt. “If you’ll have me, then...I guess I don’t have a problem with it,” the producer eventually mumbled, gently squeezing Minji’s hands in response.

After the tension in the room dissipated with the confrontation drawing to an end, Yubin felt a sudden wave of exhaustion settle over her, hyperaware of how emotionally draining the events that took place over the past few hours had been for her. Despite her apparent tiredness, however, she wasn’t sure she wanted to sleep in her own room, which no doubt reeked of alcohol...and her bad decisions. She would deal with that in the morning, but for now, she didn’t think she could be alone.

“I...don’t think I can sleep by myself right now...do you think I could…” Yubin trailed off, growing bashful as she averted her gaze to the side, her sudden nervousness making her fidget under the other girls’ stares. “I-I mean, only if it’s okay with you-”

“Of course,” Minji was quick to respond, a gentle smile curling on her soft features. “Let’s get you to bed, then.”

It wasn’t long until Yubin found herself under the older girl’s covers, something she never thought she would ever experience up until a few minutes ago. She’d be lying if she said she didn’t feel her heart skip a beat when she felt not only Minji’s, but also Yoohyeon’s arms wrap around her, or when both girls kissed her goodnight without a second thought. It was no secret that Yubin often had trouble sleeping, even with the help of several different medications, but Minji’s steady heartbeat and Yoohyeon’s endearing snores all too easily lulled the younger girl into a peaceful slumber.

It occurred to Yubin - several times, in fact - that she could very well have been dreaming the entire incident in her head, and really, it all seemed much too good to be true. But even then, she couldn’t deny how unbelievably wonderful it felt to fall asleep in their embrace.

And, come the morning with her killer headache and empty stomach, it was with the surrounding warmth of Minji and Yoohyeon encapsulating her that she realized it was, in fact, not a dream after all.


End file.
